Collective Leadership Practices Improve Teacher Efficacy and School Culture

Experience has shown, and research correlates, teachers are the single most important school-related factor affecting student achievement. For students, the difference between having a quality teacher and having an incompetent teacher can exceed one grade-level equivalent in annual achievement growth (Hanushek et al.,1992). Shortages in the teaching force continue to increase nationwide, reaching crisis proportions. Challenges facing educators, including ever-changing needs of students, adjustments in education services, increased documentation requirements, lagging student outcomes, new initiatives, discipline concerns, and the expectation for teachers to perform to meet ever-increasing demands have resulted in disengagement of educators and decisions from them to leave the profession. Redesigning the work of teachers and administrators through a model of shared decision-making, recognizing and reinforcing intrinsic motivation in teachers by capitalizing on their leadership in professional development, allows educators to grow in the profession feeling valued, empowered, and supported. The purpose of this innovative project was to provide teachers collective leadership opportunities to mentor, coach, train, and engage in reciprocal learning experiences. A collective leadership climate provides improved perceptions, increased teacher job satisfaction, improvement in self-efficacy, teacher retention, and increased student academic performance, all leading towards improvement in self-efficacy and an increase in teacher retention